Guitar Fretboard Lessons
Know the fretboard like the back of your hand

This series of guitar fretboard lessons will take you through the necessary practical steps for learning the fretboard.

We'll start with learning the basics followed by where the notes lie on the fretboard, before moving on to string/note relationships and finally intervals.

This all goes hand in hand with guitar theory and should be your first stop before moving on to learn how notes really work together in chords and scales.

Let us begin...

Guitar fretboard lessons - fretboard basics

We'll cover the basics here just in case - many guitarists play for months or even years and still don't know this stuff...

Firstly, as you probably know, the frets on your guitar are numbered - learn to number your fret spaces:

More fretboard basics here (opens in new window) >

Learning all the notes on the fretboard can be learned the easy way, or the hard way... How about the easy way for now though?

Follow the fretboard diagrams below - study one diagram a day for just 15 minutes and this will sink in very quickly.

Day 1 - E string marker notes

First, you should create "marker points" on the fretboard in your mind. Actually, they're most likely already there, on your guitar. Use the inlay markers to quickly identify the following notes...

At fret 3 - G
At fret 5 - A (so exactly the same as the open A string)
At fret 7 - B
At fret 9 - C# (C sharp - more on sharps and flats in a minute)
At fret 12 - E octave (a higher sounding E)

Then, the whole thing starts again an octave higher from the 12th fret. If you have 24 frets on your guitar, the 24th will be an even higher E note.

Day 2 - fill in the gaps

Now we just need to learn the notes on the E string in between the inlay marked notes.

Let's take a look...

This order alone can tell you all you need to know - for example the open B string starts on B obviously, so find B on the order above and follow the cycle from that point! There is a much more practical way to learn the notes all over the fretboard though which we'll look at in part 2 soon.

Tip - B and C don't have any sharps or flats in between them, neither do E and F.

Day 3 - A string marker notes

Just like with the E string notes, let's apply the same method to the A string notes.

1st, the notes at the inlay markers...

Day 4 - fill the gaps again

Just like we did with the low E string...

OK, once you've reached day 4 we can progress to the next part.

More essential guitar fretboard lessons to come...

Just before we move on to find out a quick and simple way to learn the notes on the other strings, a few final tips for this part...

• Learn the order of notes. E.g. if I asked "what comes after C# (C sharp)?", you should answer "D" or "what comes before B?" answer "Bb (B flat)"
  

• With the two strings we've covered already, you can probably see some string relation going on. The E note on the A string (fret 7) is the same as the Low E string (although obviously a lower sounding E on the open E string.)
  

• The B note on the A string (fret 2) is the same as fret 7 on the low E string.
  

• The C# note on the E string (fret 9) is the same as fret 4 on the A string
  

• etc.!

This is the kind of relationship between strings you should work on during your theory time at the moment. Check out the excellent Guitar Tricks Core Learning System for the bigger picture.